Tuesday, 5 April 2016

A
slightly weird experience. One of my two published short stories has
been included in a textbook for Swedish as
a second language. (No, I don't get any royalties for it). The reason
is, I believe, that the story is about a migrant's experience, but disguised
as a fairy tale. Fairy tale is always a good form to tell about
difficult matters.

The
story is well known in many versions: a young maiden meets a Merking
who entices her to follow him into the sea. She marries him, but
every now and then she longs back to land, and when she goes back she
has to decide whether she wants to return. I have, after many
years, made up my mind, but it wasn't straightforward. In
fact, when I wrote the story I hadn't yet made up my mind.

Anyway,
this story has already been used in Swedish SATS.
Now migrants arriving in Sweden and hopefully wishing to learn
Swedish will have a chance to read it. It
has been beautifully illustrated.

The
short introduction to the story says:

What
do you do if you like two places equally, but must choose the
one or the other? Read this fairy tale, written by the author Maria
Nikolajeva [I believe my name was important for
the choice of text]. It is a story about Renata who is torn between
the place where she was born and the place where she has lived most
of her life. Which is her home?

I
must say, I am quite moved by this introduction, and I really hope
that people who read the story will recognise themselves.

After
the story, there is a set of questions and tasks.

A.
TEXT COMPREHENSION

1.
Why did the Merking
want Renata to follow him to the bottom of the sea when they met on
the beach? [Not sure how I would answer this. He fell in love with
her? He desired her? He was sexually attracted to her?]

2.
Name three things on the bottom of the sea that were different from
what Renata was used to. [I had to re-read the story to answer this.
I think the right answer is: language, food
and darkness].

3. How
did Renata react to everything new and unfamiliar? [Hmm…
I think the answer is: She eventually got used to it. This is a
really difficult question].

4.
Why did Renata suddenly long for the land? [I thought
I knew that one, but
I had to check. She heard church bells.
Now, this is a symbol, not a claim that it is your religion that
calls you back].

5.
Tell us about Renata's first visit back to
land. [This is not a comprehension question. This is a retelling
question. It can be answered by one short
sentence, such as “She was happy”, or expanded into eternity].

6.
What had happened when Renata returned to her childhood home for the
second time? [Her
parents had died. My parents were still
alive when I wrote the story. The last
sentence is life-to-text projection and should be avoided].

7.
In the end of the story, Renata must make a difficult decision. What
decision does she have
to make and what does she decide? [To be or not to be? To have a Big
Mac or a Quarter Pounder Cheese?]

B.
READING BETWEEN THE LINES

1.
The story is about a girl, a Merking and a realm at the bottom of the
sea. What do you think these three factors [!] symbolise? [A
woman, a man and the man's home? A woman, a traficker and a
whorehouse?]

2.
Who influences Renata's choices? [The
Merking asks her nicely. The friends on land are aggressively
persistent. I think she follows her heart rather than reason].

3.
Why do you think the author has chosen to write this story as a fairy
tale? [Ask the author! Because it hurts
less to depict your painful experience in disguise. Because
imaginative writing has stronger impact on the reader than
realistic].

4.
Why do you think Renata followed the sunset in the end of the story?
[This is a good question. Heroes always follow the sunset. But I
think the correct answer is that sunset symbolises death. However,
since the sun sets in the West, you can also infer that West is
better than East. That is, for someone from Eastern Europe].

C.
CONSIDER

1.
Why do you think Renata is hesitant about where it is best for her to
live? Do you recognise her hesitation? [Well, we are all hesitant
about big decisions, but migrants may feel it stronger.This
is text-to-life projection and is one of the main reasons we read
fiction].

2.
Renata is a woman and the Merking is a man. In the story, the woman
is torn between the two worlds. Would it be the same if Renata were a
man? Why? Why not? [It is doubtless women who more frequently follow
men. Even the Bible prescribes it. But I cannot see why it couldn't
be the other way round. And there are many
fairy tales with exactly such reversed gender roles. I am curious
what the students say. Some may
misunderstand the question and consider whether the Merking could
fall in love with a man].

3.
What do you think about Renata's final decision? Would you make the
same decision? Why? Why not? [Now, an important aspect of the story
is that Renata loves her husband, and she has followed him of her own
will. If as a migrant you escape from war or poverty you may have
other reasons for staying or leaving. Also you may or may not like
your new country and feel
welcome and comfortable.
Renata loves the sea realm, she has learned the language, she has
learned to cook, and she is used to darkness. The merpeople have
accepted her. She has children and grandchildren and
great-grandchildren. And she has absolutely nothing to return to. But
again, I would be curious to know how the conversation goes in this
class].

Then
come the exercises. The story, the task says, uses many adjectives [I
think it was deliberate]. The various
assignmentsare to match
adjectives and nouns, to build adjectives from nouns (for
instance, “sunny” form “sun”) and
from verbs (for instance, “shining” from “shine”).

Well,
I don't really like fiction used to train adjectives. However, as I
know from my recent cognitive studies, associative memory is strong,
and if the adjectives will in the future remind the students of my
story, maybe it's not a bad thing.

The
final assignment is to summarise the story. The assignment explains
the importance of key words in a summary. What are the key words of
my story? I don't think you can find them in the text. You will have
to read between the lines.

Sunday, 28 February 2016

Everybody in Sweden today shares their memories of Olof Palme, the Swedish Prime Minister who was assassinated thirty years ago. A bit similar to J F Kennedy: everybody - old enough - remembers what they did. I am old enough. But that's another story.

On the day following the assassination, Staffan and I were going to a city in Sweden where a play he had translated was opening. I was still in bed when Staffan stormed in, screaming: "I am not going to any f*ing opening night!" My reaction was that the author had said something stupid or the theater had misspelled Staffan's name on the poster or something mundane like that. Instead, he threw the morning paper at me, with Palme on the front page.

The opening night was of course postponed, and Staffan and I, together with the rest of Sweden, spent the following days in front of television.

Inescapably, I remembered my only encounter with Palme, which I will share now. A couple of years earlier, there was another opening night (now you will get the impression that we didn't do anything other that attend opening nights, which is very true since Staffan was much involved with theatre in those days). It was a musical which Staffan co-authored and which featured a very famous actress in the main role. It so happened that she had participated in Palme's election campaign, and therefore he was a guest of honour at the performance and the following party. I happened to sit next to him at the party, and when he realised I was Russian, he looked at me, took a deep breath and started reciting one of the best-known Russian poems by Alexander Pushkin:

Буря мглою небо кроет,
Вихри снежные крутя...

There he stopped, and I picked up without thinking and finished the whole poem, which ends by a proposal to have a drink, which we did.

Staffan thought it was hilarious when I told him. Not that the Swedish Prime Minister could recite the first two lines of Russian poem, which he had likely learned as a child from his Russian nanny, but that I could immediately pick up and continue. I didn't find it remarkable at all. Every educated person in Russia can recite poetry for hours.

Monday, 15 February 2016

This is a column I wrote for a Swedish daily in February 2007, when the world lived in anticipation of the final volume of the Harry Potter saga. I feel it still holds true, so here it is for your amusement.

There are speculations
about whether J K Rowling intends to kill Harry Potter off in the
final book of the formidable series. The author seems to have said
that it is appropriate to let the protagonist die so that nobody can
pinch him and write a sequel.

As if it has ever stopped literary thieves.

For a start, a couple of books
about Harry's life before he learns
that he is a
powerful wizard. Nice books about everyday adventures with the
abominable cousin. They will probably be less exciting than Harry's
breath-taking escapades at
Hogwarts, but it's child's play for a good writer, and
the fans would love to know more about
their darling. If Scarlett's
Childhood can satisfy Gone
with the Wind fans, why not Harry
Potter's Childhood?

A set of at least five volumes can be devoted to
Harry's parents, including
his dad's pranks mentioned in passing throughout the series. Details
about his friendship and rivalry with Harry's teachers will doubtless
be welcomed by many readers. It might be permissible to add some
erotic flavour that Harry is spared.

Hermione, Ron, Ginny and the Weasley twins will
all get a series of their own. Unfortunately, Mergione's
Private Mission and Sen
Awesley's Twelve Deeds have already
been published by two quick-minded Russian writers, but otherwise the
sky is the limit. Moreover, Hermione has a time-turner which allows
her to be in two places at the same time, to attend twice as many
classes. If she lets Harry borrow the time-turner, all his seven
years at Hogwarts can be repeated, in a parallel dimension.

Harry Potter'sCook Book and
Harry Potter's
Feng Shuiare guaranteed bestsellers. Huge
success can also be predicted for The
True Confessions of Harry Potter and
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Harry
Potter.

If Harry necessarily
must die in the end of the final book, there is always hope that he
would do it with Hermione just before he dies, and then Harry Jr, or
possibly Harriet, can take over. There is of course something Da
Vinci Codeover
it, but it is surely within fair use. This plot
can be stretched for at least twelve volumes.

However, it would be much nicer is Harry lives,
becomes Head of Hogwarts, introduces a democratic student union and
initiates international collaboration with other wizard schools in a
true Bologna spirit.

It may be hard to do all this before the interest
fades, but there are many examples of large teams of ghost writers
who will easily produce three-four books a month. Although they should
preferably be well educated and well read in myths as well as world
literature to maintain the level of Rowling's witty allusions. A
couple of unemployed professors of English literature may run
workshops.

But if Harry really dies in the end of the final
volume, don't mourn him too long, dear friends all over the world.
There are many stories in which the hero dies
and is
resurrected, from The New Testament
to Sherlock Holmes.

PS.
All ideas in this column are copyright protected and available for
best bid. Nothing under six-digit will not be considered.